I don’t often do this, but, this is instructive, so, I’m borrowing from some prominent skeptic blogs and putting my perspective on it.

It’s sorta fun watching children grow up. But, it’s scary at times, as well. They grow up sheltered from reality, blithely roaming the earth smelling flowers and playing. Often they play “grown up”. Now, the rate of maturation varies from child to child. Some run off from the bosom of their parents as soon as they think they’re ready. Others will stay attached to the teat as long as they can. Others still will actively seek to find surrogate parents and stay in a level of immaturity for a long as possible.

We see this take form in a few places. Some simply turn to the government as a surrogate parent/provider. Others find comfort and protection in the protective arms of academia. There they can be protected from the harsh winds and storms of reality for perpetuity. This wouldn’t be so bad, but, often these children become confused and think academia is a real-world environment, and they venture out unaware of the stark contrasts between the coddling arms of an alma mater versus a real world environment.

For many years now, many academics have come to believe that science takes place in the comforting confines of academia. It isn’t. It never was. Discovery, innovation, and invention happen in the real world. Sure, sometimes parts of academia help, but, more often than not their version of science doesn’t fit what the real world states. This isn’t surprising because academics have no idea what the real world actually looks like.

Nothing illustrates this better than the skeptic blogs. This is where climate science is conducted. You see, we’re not constrained by political correctness. Certain thoughts and ideas are not off-limits. How thoughts and ideas relate to the rest of the world is also given consideration. Debate isn’t confined to a selected few who agree with any particular position. In other words, on the blogs, climate science is confronted with reality.

The other day, we witnessed academia once again clashing with reality. A certain tree ring hockey stick had to be withdrawn. Now, originally, after resistance by one author, another stepped in, acknowledged the error, and supposedly went on his way. This was played out over at ClimateAudit. You’d think the climate nuts would learn by now, they’re not getting their invented maths by Steve McIntyre and his crew.

Apparently, this has led to some anger about the butthurt Steve Mac et al put on these academics. It has led Dr. Karoly to outright lie about what is happening. In a book review for none other than Mikey Mann, Karoly writes,

Commentators with no scientific expertise, ranging from politicians such as Republican congressman Joe Barton from Texas, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, or Republican Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma, to blog writers Stephen McIntyre and Marc Morano, have repeatedly promulgated misinformation and sought to launch formal investigations into Mann’s research, claiming professional misconduct or worse, even though it had been peer reviewed and confirmed by other scientists.

Now, this is a fascinating claim. Karoly, apparently, is an obliviot. But, that’s being charitable. He knows full well that ClimateAudit found the error in the paper which he himself was an author. He should also know that McIntyre is published in the very journals he wishes he could publish in. So, Steve Mac writes obliviot Karoly a letter. (emphasis mine)

Commentators with no scientific expertise, ranging from politicians such as Republican congressman Joe Barton from Texas, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, or Republican Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma, to blog writers Stephen McIntyre and Marc Morano, have repeatedly promulgated misinformation and sought to launch formal investigations into Mann’s research, claiming professional misconduct or worse, even though it had been peer reviewed and confirmed by other scientists

I try to write accurately and, to my knowledge, have not “promulgated misinformation” about Mann’s research, let alone done so “repeatedly”. Together with coauthor Ross McKitrick, I published criticism of Mann’s work in the same peer reviewed journal as Mann et al 1999. We published these criticisms in good faith. In my opinion, not only have the specific criticisms not been refuted in subsequent commentary, but, if anything, our findings have been confirmed even by adversaries. For example, our finding that the verification r2 of the Mann et al reconstruction was not only not significant but ~0 was confirmed by the very adversarial Wahl and Ammann article. While some topics remain in controversy, I note that neither the National Research Council Report nor the Wegman Report in 2006 identified any errors in our work; that the Wegman Report, in particular, strongly endorsed our work and that Gerald North, the Chairman of the National Research Council report, when asked, stated that he agreed with the conclusions of the Wegman Report. While such endorsements do not ensure that our findings are correct (though I believe our findings to be correct), the failure of these panels to explicitly identify errors speaks strongly against your allegation of promulgating “misinformation”.

Obviously, I have also commented extensively at Climate Audit, but always try to be accurate and to correct any errors when pointed out. I request that you either provide me forthwith with specific examples of the “misinformation” that you allege that I’ve promulgated or withdraw the allegation with an apology.

Your recent experience with Gergis et al 2012 should have demonstrated to you that “peer review” by an academic journal is hardly a guarantee of the validity of results, let alone assurance that authors have even implemented their claimed methodologies. I further observe in this connection that your public statement in connection with the withdrawal of Gergis et al 2012 did not include any acknowledgement of Climate Audit’s role in identifying the error in Gergis et al. Your public statement was:

An issue has been identified in the processing of the data used in the study, “Evidence of unusual late 20th century warming from an Australasian temperature reconstruction spanning the last millennium” by Joelle Gergis, Raphael Neukom, Stephen Phipps, Ailie Gallant and David Karoly, accepted for publication in the Journal of Climate. The authors are currently reviewing the data and methods. The revised paper will be re-submitted to the Journal of Climate by the end of July and it will be sent out for peer review again.

LMAO!!! The link is where I believe the discussion ensued which found the error. A CA commenter Jean S started it. Now, anyone familiar with Steve Mac’s writing style knows what this is about. But, Karoly doesn’t. It is quite likely Karoly has never been spanked like this before. So, what is the reaction of Karoly? If Karoly had been walking about in the real world for a few years, then he would have acknowledge his stupidity and gone on. But, he’s likely never had been confronted with reality, so what does he do? He writes in SS, (another haven against reality for the children)

……In Australia, I have just received a threat of legal action from Steve McIntyre in Canadaand am currently dealing with 6 different FOI requests.

Lol, they’re attempting to set up legal obstacles for the public to see their own data and to attempt to protect themselves from people living in the real world. Steve Mac doesn’t litigate. He point’s out math and science errors. He blogs about it. Occasionally he publishes his findings. But, before anyone goes away thinking CA is the only place where this occurs, I would point out that there are many other places with a different prism hold the children’s’ work in the harsh light of reality. Jo Nova, CA, WUWT, Real Science, Air Vent, and the list goes on and on. (I’m sorry I can’t begin to list them all) Even this humble blogger recently had his work verified by other researchers. Oh? Did this go unnoticed by a few? Last month, I demonstrated that even according to the satellites own manufactured numbers, that the sea level rate of rise hasn’t accelerated in over the last twenty years. That’s for the next post….

So, I say to Dr. Karoly, welcome to reality, son. In this world you have to demonstrate you know what you’re talking about. It’s harsh out here, but the rewards of dealing with reality far outweigh your coddled world. You’ve got 3 choices. You can scurry back to the shielding arms of academia, you can stay your course and become an object of scorn and ridicule, or, you can address reality, learn from your mistakes, and grow as an individual. My experience with these types of people are that they’ve never been instructed on intestinal fortitude, so sadly, they most often opt for the prior two options.